Archive for December 2008

Over the past decade there has been, for me, a complete change of perspective, for I have gone from upholding and violently propagating the racialism of National-Socialism – and encouraging the overthrow of the existing status quo through revolutionary insurrection – to the acceptance of empathy and compassion, and to that gentle, quiet, desire to cease to cause suffering, which form the basis for what I have called The Numinous Way, with this Numinous Way being apolitical, undogmatic, and considering both race and “the folk” as unethical abstractions which move us away from empathy and compassion and which thus obscure our true human nature.

Why unethical? Because The Numinous Way uncovers, through empathy, the nexion we, as individuals, are to all life, thus making us aware of how all life – sentient and otherwise – is connected and part of that matrix, that Unity, which is the Cosmos, and it is a knowing and appreciation of this connexion which is lost when we impose abstractions upon life, and especially when we judge other beings by a criteria established by some such abstraction. For this knowing and appreciation of our connexion to other life is the beginning of compassion, and a presencing – a manifestation – of our humanity, of our knowing of ourselves in relation to other life, and the Cosmos itself; and, thus, a placing of us, as individuals, in an ethical, and a Cosmic, perspective.

This change of my perspective – this personal change in me – arose, or derived, from several things: from involvement with and belief in, during the past decade, a certain Way of Life, considered by many to be a religion; from thinking deeply about certain ethical questions whose genesis was reflecting upon my thirty years of violent political activism; and from a variety of personal events and experiences, two of which events involved the loss of loved ones, and one of which loss involved the suicide of my fiancée.

However, this change was a slow, often difficult, process, and there was to be, during this decade, a stubborn refusal, by me, to follow – except for short periods – where this change led me; a stubborn refusal to-be, except for short periods, the person I was shown to be, should-be, by and through this alchemical process of inner change. Thus was there a stubborn clinging to doing what I conceived to be my honourable duty, and it is only in the last month that I have finally and to my own satisfaction resolved, in an ethical way, the dilemma of such a duty, thus ending my association with a particular Way of Life, which Way many consider a religion.

During this decade of inner reflexion, of great outward change – of lifestyle, occupation, belief, place of dwelling – there was a quite slow rediscovery of the individual I had been before my fanatical pursuit of a political cause became the priority of my life: the person behind the various rôles played or assumed, over more than three decades, for the purpose of attaining particular outer goals deriving from some abstraction, some ideal, or some other impersonal thing. That is, I gradually, over the past decade, ceased believing in a certain principle which I had formerly accepted; which principle I had placed before my own personal feelings; which principle I had used, quite deliberately, to change myself; and which principle I had stubbornly adhered to for almost four decades, believing that it was my honourable duty to do so.

This principle was that in order to attain one’s “ideal world”, certain sacrifices had to be made “for the greater good”. In accord with this principle, I considered I had certain duties, and accordingly sacrificed not only my own, personal, happiness, but also that of others, including that of four women who loved me; and it is perhaps fair to conclude that it was this principle which made me seem to others to be, for three decades, a political fanatic, and – for many years after that – a kind of religious zealot. Indeed, it is probably even fairer to conclude that I was indeed such a fanatic and such a zealot, for, in the pursuit of some abstraction, some ideal, some notion of duty, some dogma, I deliberately controlled my own nature, a nature evident – over the decades – in my poetry; in my wanderings as a vagabond; in my initial enthusiasm as a Christian monk; in the tears cried upon hearing some sublime piece of music; in my love of Nature, and of women. That is, there were always times in my life when I reverted back to being the person I felt, I knew, I was; always times when I stopped, for a few months, or a year or maybe longer, interfering in the world; when I ceased to place a perceived duty before myself, and when I thus interacted with others, with the world, only in a direct, personal, empathic way sans some ideal, some dogma.

Now, I have finally come to understand that this principle of idealism, the guiding principle of most of my adult life, is unethical, and therefore fundamentally wrong and inhuman. That is, it is a manufactured abstraction; a great cause of suffering, and that nothing – no idealism, no cause, no ideal, no dogma, no perceived duty – is worth or justifies the suffering of any living-being, sentient or otherwise. That it is empathy, compassion and a personal love which are human, the essence of our humanity: not some abstract notion of duty; not some idealism. That it is the impersonal interference in the affairs of others – based on some cause, some belief, some dogma, some perceived duty, some ideology, some creed, some ideal, some manufactured abstraction – which causes and greatly contributes to suffering, and which moves us far away from empathy and compassion and thus diverts us from our humanity and from changing ourselves, in a quiet way, into a more evolved, a more empathic and more compassionate, human being.

Thus, in many ways, The Numinous Way – as now developed, and as explicated by me in the past month (see Footnote 1 ) – represents my true nature: the hard, difficult, re-discovery of what I had controlled, and lost; and, perhaps more importantly, an evolution of that personal nature as a result of my diverse experiences, my learning from my mistakes, and my empathic awareness of the suffering I have caused to others.

Hence, I have been, for many decades, wrong; misguided. Or, rather, I misguided myself, allowing idealism and a perceived duty to triumph over, to veil, my humanity. My good intentions were no excuse, even though, for nearly four decades, I made them an excuse, as idealists always do. For, during all the decades of my various involvements – of my arrogant interference based on some abstraction – I sincerely believed I was doing what was “right”, or “honourable”, and that such suffering as I caused, or aided, or incited, was “necessary” for some ideal to be born in some “future”.

But now my inescapable reality is that of a personal empathy, a personal compassion, a simple, quiet, letting-be; a knowing that such answers as I have, now, are just my answers, and that I have no duty other than to be human, to gently strive to be a better human being through reforming myself by quietly cultivating empathy and compassion. Of course, I do not expect to be understood, and probably will continue to be judged, by others, according to some, or all, of my former beliefs, involvements.

So I rest – tired, awake, exhausted, from days of work,
Worry, Dreams, and Thought
Resting while the hot Sun flows
And the fastly flowing nebulae of clouds, wind-spaked,
Grow tendrils to shape themselves with faces
Here:
One planet gasping as it gasps
Since the slaying by Homo Hubris never ever seems
To stop.

Too late the empathy to set us flowing
Back to love?
So much promise for so long undesired
I am left sad, warm, sleepy
While the Summer Sun brings peace enough
To sleep-me
As the circling Buzzard
Cries.So There Is Warm Sun

The Numinous Way is the name given, by Myatt himself, to his own particular Weltanschauung, his own perspective about life, which has been expounded in a recent (December, 2008 AD) collection of essays entitled Empathy, Compassion, and Honour: The Numinous Way of Life. Thus, the majority of my references are to the chapters, and appendices, of this work (1).

Myatt’s particular perspective, or philosophy of life – or apprehension, as Myatt himself calls it – is, in my view, fundamentally a mystical one. That is, it is based on a personal intuitive insight about, a personal awareness of, the nature of Reality. This personal insight is that “individual human beings, are a connexion to all other life, on this planet which is currently our home, and a connexion to the Cosmos itself.” (2)

According to Myatt, this awareness is that arising from empathy; more, precisely, from the faculty of empathy, which he explains is an awareness of, and a sympathy with, other living beings (3), and which he defines, in a somewhat technical way, as “a manifestation, an awareness, of our relation to acausality, and in particular as an awareness of the related and dependant nature of those beings which express or manifest or which presence acausal energy and which are thus described, in a causal way, as possessing life” (4). His other, more simple explanation, is of empathy, in relation to human beings, as “our ability to know, to be aware of, the feelings, the suffering, of others.” (5)

This mystical insight of Myatt’s led him, over a period of a decade, to develop and increasingly refine The Numinous Way, and this development and process of refinement was, according to him, inspired and aided by his own personal experiences and by his quest among, and experience of, the religions of the world. As he states (6), his conclusions are:

“The result of a four-decade long pathei mathos: the result of my many and diverse and practical (and, to many others, weird and strange) involvements (political, and otherwise), and my many and diverse and practical quests among the philosophies, Ways of Life, and religions, of the world. The Numinous Way is, in particular, the result of the often difficult process of acknowledging my many personal mistakes – many of which caused or contributed to suffering – and (hopefully) learning from these mistakes.”

These conclusions have led him to reject all the beliefs and views he formerly adhered to, and which he is publicly known for. Among the beliefs and views he has come to reject, as a result of what it is, I believe, accurate to describe as a life long gnostic search for knowledge, and wisdom (7), are National Socialism and its racialist policies, and both Islam and Christianity, all of which he had practical experience of, and a personal involvement with, lasting many years.

As Myatt himself claims, his philosophy of The Numinous Way is emphatically apolitical, rejects the dogma prevalent in established religions; rejects nationalism, racialism and racial prejudice; emphasizes and embraces tolerance, and is fundamentally an individual way of life centered on the virtues of empathy, compassion and personal honor (8).

As Myatt states:

“There has been, for me, a profound change of emphasis, a following of the cosmic ethic of empathy to its logical and honourable conclusion, and thus a rejection of all unethical abstractions.” (9)

A Complete Philosophy of Life

In order to qualify as a complete, and distinct, philosophy – in order to be a Weltanschauung – a particular philosophical viewpoint should possess the following:

1) A particular ontology, which describes and explains the concept of Being, and beings, and our relation to them;
2) A particular theory of ethics, defining and explaining what is good, and what is bad;
3) A particular theory of knowledge (an epistemology); of how truth and falsehood can be determined;

It should also be able to give particular answers to questions such as “the meaning and purpose of our lives”, and explain how the particular posited purpose may or could be attained.

What follows is a brief, and introductory, analysis of how Myatt’s The Numinous Way deals with each of the above topics.

Ontology

Myatt, in the essay Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way, states that, according to The Numinous Way, “there are two types of being, differentiated by whether or not they possess, or manifest, what is termed acausal energy”. That is, he introduces the concept of a causal Universe, and an acausal Universe, which together form “the Cosmos”, or Reality itself.

This causal Universe is the phenomenal world known to use via our five senses, and knowledge of this causal Universe is obtained through conventional sciences based upon practical observation (10). The acausal Universe is known to us via our faculty of empathy, since the acausal is the genesis of that particular type of energy which makes physical matter “alive” (11). That is, according to Myatt, all living beings are nexions, which are places – regions (or, one might say, “bodies”) – in the causal Universe where acausal energy is present, or manifests, or, to use Myatt’s term, is presenced. Hence, according to Myatt, “The Numinous Way adds empathy to the faculties by which we can perceive, know, and understand the Cosmos… Empathy is an essential means to knowing and understanding Life, which Life includes human beings…” (12)

In his earlier essay, Acausal Science: Life and The Nature of the Acausal, Myatt gives a little more detail as to the nature of acausal being, that is, the nature the acausal itself and of acausal energy.

Ethics

The ethics of Myatt’s Numinous Way derive from empathy, and in the section Ethics and the Dependant Nature of Beingof the chapter Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way it is stated that:

“The faculty of empathy – and the conscious understanding of the nature of Reality – leads to a knowing, an understanding, of suffering. Part of suffering is that covering-up which occurs when a causal denoting is applied to living beings, and especially to human beings, which denoting implies a judgement (a pre-judgement) of such life according to some abstract construct or abstract value, so that the “worth” or “value” of a living-being is often incorrectly judged by such abstract constructs or abstract values.”

From a knowing and understanding of suffering, compassion arises, and:

“Empathy is thus, for The Numinous Way, the source of ethics, for what is good is considered to be that which manifests empathy and compassion and honour, and thus what alleviates, or what ceases to cause, suffering: for ourselves, for other human beings, and for the other life with which we share this planet. Hence, what is unethical, or wrong, is what causes or what contributes to or which continues such suffering.”

Furthermore, Myatt defines honor (or, more precisely, personal honor) as an ethical means to aid the cessation of suffering (13) and thus as “a practical manifestation of empathy: of how we can relate to other people, and other life, in an empathic and compassionate way”.

In addition, it is worth noting that Myatt views what he calls ‘abstractions’ as immoral, since abstraction obscures, or cover-ups, the essence, the being – the reality – of beings themselves. That is, such abstractions undermine, or replace, or distort, empathy, and thus distance us from life, from our true human nature, and lead us to identify with such abstractions instead of identifying with, sympathizing with, living beings. (14)

Epistemology

In Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way, Myatt writes:

“For The Numinous Way, truth begins with a knowing of the reality of being and Being – part of which is a knowing of the dependant nature of living beings.”

Furthermore,

“There is… a fundamental and important distinction made, by The Numinous Way, between how we can, and should, perceive and understand the causal, phenomenal, physical, universe, and how we can, and should, perceive and understand living beings. The physical world can be perceived and understood as: (1) existing external to ourselves, with (2) our limited understanding of this ‘external world’ depending for the most part upon what we can see, hear or touch: on what we can observe or come to know via our senses; with (3) logical argument, or reason, being a most important means to knowledge and understanding of and about this ‘external world’, and a means whereby we can make reasonable assumptions about it, which assumptions can be refuted or affirmed via observation and experiment; and (4) with the physical Cosmos being, of itself, a reasoned order subject to laws which are themselves understandable by reason. In this perception and understanding of the causal, phenomenal, inanimate universe, concepts, denoting, ideas, forms, abstractions, and such like, are useful and often necessary.” (15)

Hence, Myatt conceives of there being two distinct types of knowing. That of the causal Universe, which derives from our senses and from practical science, and that of living beings, which derives from our empathy with such living beings, from a knowing that we are not separate from those living beings, but only one manifestation of that acausal, living, energy which connects all living beings, sentient and otherwise. (16) This second type of knowing derives from empathy, and is one means whereby we can apprehend the acausal, which is the matrix, The Unity, of connexions which is all life, presenced as living-beings in the causal. (17)

According to Myatt:

“The error of conventional philosophies – the fundamental philosophical error behind abstractionism – is to apply causal perception and a causal denoting to living being(s).” (18)

Praxeology

The primary goal is seen as living in such a way that we, as individuals, cease to cause suffering to other life. This means us using, and developing empathy, and thus changing – reforming – ourselves.

“How can we develope this faculty [of empathy]? How can we reform ourselves and so evolve? The answer of The Numinous Way is that this is possible through compassion, empathy, gentleness, reason, and honour: through that gentle letting-be which is the real beginning of wisdom and a manifestation of our humanity. To presence, to be, what is good in the world – we need to change ourselves, through developing empathy and compassion, through letting-be, that is, ceasing to interfere, ceasing to view others (and “the world”) through the immorality of abstractions, and ceasing to strive to change or get involved with what goes beyond the limits determined by personal honour.” (19)

Why should we pursue such a goal? Myatt answers, in a rather mystical and gnostic way, that:

“Empathy, compassion, and a living by honour, are a means whereby we increase, or access for ourselves, acausal energy – where we presence such energy in the causal – and whereby we thus strengthen the matrix of Life, and, indeed, increase Life itself. Thus, when we live in such an ethical way we are not only aiding life here, now, in our world, in our lifetime, we are also aiding all future life, in the Cosmos, for the more acausal energy we presence, by our deeds, our living, the more will be available not only to other life, here – in our own small causal Time and causal Space – but also, on our mortal death, available to the Cosmos to bring-into-being more life. Thus will we aid – and indeed become part of – the very change, the very evolution of the life of the Cosmos itself.”

The Acausal and The Cosmic Being

Myatt’s concept of what he terms the acausal is central to understanding his philosophy of The Numinous Way. He conceives of this acausal as a natural part of the Cosmos, which Cosmos he defines as the unity of the physical, causal, Universe, and of the acausal Universe. This acausal Universe has an a-causal geometry and an a-causal time, and there exists, in this acausal Universe, a-causal energy of a type quite different from the physical energy of causal Space-Time, which causal energy is known to us and described by causal sciences such as Physics. (20)

This acausal energy is, according to Myatt, what animates physical matter and makes it alive, and thus he conceives as life in the causal, physical, Universe as a place – a nexion – where acausal energy is “presenced” (manifested) in causal Space-Time. Hence, all living beings are, for Myatt, a connection, a nexion, to the acausal itself, and thus all living beings are connected to each other. This connectively is felt, revealed to us, as human beings, through empathy (21). Compassion is knowing, and acting upon, this connectivity of life, since “our very individuality is a type of abstraction in itself, and thus something of an illusion, for it often obscures our relation to other life…” (22)

The acausal is thus the matrix of connectivity, where all life exists in the immediacy of the moment, and where causal abstractions, based on finite causal thinking, have no meaning and no value.

Myatt conceives of what he terms a Cosmic Being, which is regarded as the Cosmos in evolution, becoming sentient through the evolution of living beings. That is, the Cosmic Being is itself a type of living entity, manifest (or “incarnated”) in all living beings, including ourselves, and Nature. (23)

“The Cosmic Being….. is not perfect, nor omniscient, not God, not any human-manufactured abstraction. That is, it is instead a new kind of apprehension of Being: a Cosmic one, based upon empathy, and an apprehension which takes us far beyond conventional theology and ontology.” (24)

Thus, this Cosmic Being is not to be viewed in a religious, theological, way, as some kind of deity, for we are part of this Being, as this Being is us and all other life, changing, evolving, coming-into-consciousness (25).

Pathei Mathos

One phrase which frequently occurs in Myatt’s writings about his Numinous Way – and which he often uses in his private correspondence and his autobiographical essays – is the Greek term πάθει μάθος. Myatt, in his own translation of The Agamemnon by Aeschylus, translates this as learning from adversity. Pathei Mathos is how Myatt describes his own strange personal journey, his gnostic search for knowledge, wisdom and meaning, and his ultimate rejection of the various beliefs, ideologies, and religions, he studied and embraced in the course of this four decade long journey.

A large part of this learning from adversity is, for him, firstly an acknowledgment of his personal errors in adhering to and identifying with various “abstractions” – which he admits caused or contributed to suffering – and, secondly, the sometimes painful and difficult personal process of learning from these mistakes and thus changing one’s outlook and beliefs in an ethical way.

As Myatt states:

“In essence, there was, for me, pathei mathos. Due to this pathei mathos, I have gone far beyond any and all politics, and beyond conventional religion and theology toward what I believe and feel is the essence of our humanity, manifest in empathy, compassion, personal love and personal honour. Hence, I cannot in truth be described by any political or by any religious label, or be fitted into any convenient category, just as no -ism or no -ology can correctly describe The Numinous Way itself, or even the essence of that Way. Therefore, I believe it is incorrect to judge me by my past associations, by my past involvements, by some of my former effusions, for all such things – all the many diverse such things – were peregrinations, part of sometimes painful often difficult decades-long process of learning and change, of personal development, of interior struggle and knowing, which has enabled me to understand my many errors, my multitude of mistakes, and – hopefully – learn from them.” (26)

In addition, he does not make any claims for his Numinous Way, other than it represents his own personal conclusions about life.

“The Numinous Way is but one answer to the questions about existence; it does not have some monopoly on truth, nor does it claim any prominence, accepting that all the diverse manifestations of the Numen, all the diverse answers, of the various numinous Ways and religions, have or may have their place, and all perhaps may serve the same ultimate purpose – that of bringing us closer to the ineffable beauty, the ineffable goodness, of life; that of transforming us, reminding us; that of giving us as individuals the chance to cease to cause suffering, to presence the good, to be part of the Numen itself.” (27)

Conclusion

This short overview of Myatt’s Numinous Way reveals it as a comprehensive and, in my view, rather original, moral philosophy with an ethics and a praxeology which, while having some resemblance to those of Buddhism, are quite distinct by reason of (a) how Myatt relates, and defines, empathy and honor, and how such honor allows for the employment, in certain situations, of reasonable (“honorable”) force (28), and (b) how Myatt views human life in terms of the acausal, and as a means for us to “reform and evolve” ourselves.

The goal of The Numinous Way is seen as us, as individuals, becoming aware of and having empathy with all life, and this involves us using and developing our faculty of empathy, being compassionate, and thus increasing the amount of life, of acausal energy, in the Cosmos, leading to not only the evolution of life, but also to a cosmic sentience, which we, when we are empathic, compassionate and honorable, are part of and which we can become aware of.

JR Wright
Oxford
December 27, 2008 AD

Notes:

1) This work (currently an e-text in both html and pdf formats) appears in some editions under the alternative title The Numinous Way of Life: Empathy, Compassion, and Honour. This work is due to be published in book format late in 2009. In addition to citing this work, I have, on occasion, referred to recent private correspondence between Myatt and myself (both written, and e-mail) where he elucidates certain matters in response to a particular question, or questions, of mine.
2) An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life
3) In Compassion, Empathy and Honour: The Ethics of the Numinous Way
4) Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way
6) Introduction, Empathy, Compassion, and Honour: The Numinous Way of Life
7) A Gnostic is someone who seeks gnosis – wisdom and knowledge; someone involved in a life-long search,a quest, for understanding, and who more often than not views the world, or more especially ordinary routine life, as often mundane and often as a hindrance. In my view, this is a rather apt description of Myatt.
8) Refer to Frequently Asked Questions About The Numinous Way and An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life
9) Introduction, Empathy, Compassion, and Honour: The Numinous Way of Life10) Refer to the section Ontology and The Numinous Way in the chapter A Brief Analysis of The Immorality of Abstraction, and also to Myatt’s earlier essay Acausal Science: Life and The Nature of the Acausal which is referenced in that chapter.11)A Brief Analysis of The Immorality of Abstraction12) A Brief Analysis of The Immorality of Abstraction13) An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life14)Refer to Myatt’s recent essay, A Change of Perspective, dated December 21, 200815)A Brief Analysis of The Immorality of Abstraction16) Refer to An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life and Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way and also Presencing The Numen In The Moment17) A Change of Perspective. Also, private e-mail from Myatt to JRW, December 22, 2008
18) A Brief Analysis of The Immorality of Abstraction
19) An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life
20) Acausal Science: Life and The Nature of the Acausal
21) Private e-mail from Myatt to JRW, December 21, 2008
22) An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life. See also The Numinous Way and Life Beyond Death
23) Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way. Also, private e-mail from Myatt to JRW, December 22, 2008
24) Ontology, Ethics and The Numinous Way
25) Private e-mail from Myatt to JRW, December 22, 2008 and private letter from Myatt to JRW, which he dated 9.xii.08 (CE)
26) Presencing The Numen In The Moment
27) The Empathic Essence
28) Refer to An Overview of The Numinous Way of Life and also The Principles of Numinous Law

The Numinous Way is a particular way of individual living; that is, it is a Way of Life, which individuals can choose to follow. The basis, the foundation, of The Numinous Way is the belief that we, as individual human beings, are a connexion to all other life, on this planet which is currently our home, and a connexion to the Cosmos itself. Thus, we are a connexion to – connected with – Nature. We are or we can be aware of this connexion through the faculty of empathy.

An awareness of this connexion, and the cultivation of our latent faculty of empathy with living beings, disposes us toward compassion and toward acting in accord with personal honour. Thus empathy disposes us to be compassionately aware of others, of the suffering of all living beings, and particularly aware of the reality that human beings are unique individuals who, like ourselves, can suffer pain, sadness, and experience joy and love. Personal honour directs us to treat people with manners, and respect, and as we ourselves would like to be treated. That is, personal honour disposes us toward both dignity and fairness, and, in a quite simple way, honour is a practical manifestation of empathy: of how we can relate to other people, and other life, in an empathic and compassionate way.

From compassion arises the desire to cease to cause suffering, the desire to alleviate suffering – and honour is one ethical way by which and how we can do this, for honour disposes us to restrain ourselves and so do the right, the moral, the empathic, thing. Thus, compassion and honour are how we can develope, and extend, our innate – but often underused or ignored – human faculty of empathy.

Empathy is thus, for The Numinous Way, the source of ethics, for what is good is considered to be that which manifests empathy and compassion and honour, and thus what alleviates, or what ceases to cause, suffering: for ourselves, for other human beings, and for the other life with which we share this planet. Hence, what is unethical, or wrong, is what causes or what contributes to or which continues such suffering.

Essentially, The Numinous Way places our own lives, as individuals, into a particular context: that of the Nature, of all Life, and of the Cosmos beyond the life which is Nature, and it provides practical guidelines – a code of ethics – to enable us to strive to live our own lives in an empathic, compassionate, and thus honourable, way.

The Numinous:

Empathy also makes us aware, or can – by its development – makes us aware, of the numinous: that is, of those things which do or which can or which have presenced (“manifested”) the beauty, the joy, the awe, the “sacredness” – the goodness – felt in those moments when we are transported beyond ourselves and become aware of the connexion between all life, and of the underlying unity beyond us, and of the potential we as individuals and as human beings possess to be a source of joy, positive change, and of love.

In a simple sense, the numinous places our own personal lives in a larger context: that of other human beings; that of the other life with which we share this planet; and that of the very Cosmos itself, with its billions upon billions of stars and billions upon billions of Galaxies, some of which stars and some of which Galaxies may well have life-bearing planets of their own.

What is numinous is that which predisposes us to change ourselves in an ethical way; that which reminds us of our mortality – of life, existence, beyond us; that which manifests the essence of Life itself, and that which re-presents to us what we feel is beautiful and good.

Empathy itself expresses – or can express – the numinous, and what is of particular importance about empathy is that it is only and ever personal. That is, empathy – like the numinous – only lives and thrives within an individual living being; it cannot be abstracted out of a living, individual, being.

A Reformation and Evolution of Ourselves:

One of the basic principles of The Numinous Way is that we human beings possess the ability to change ourselves. That is, we possess the faculty to consciously change our behaviour, our attitudes, our way of living. Thus, we are much more than just animals who possess the faculty of speech and the ability of conscious, rational, thought, for we have the faculty of will which enables us to restrain and control ourselves. However, like the faculty of empathy, our faculty of will – the faculty of reformation and evolution of ourselves – is often underused or ignored.

How can we develope this faculty? How can we reform ourselves and so evolve? The answer of The Numinous Way is that this is possible through compassion, empathy, gentleness, reason, and honour: through that gentle letting-be which is the real beginning of wisdom and a manifestation of our humanity. To presence, to be, what is good in the world – we need to change ourselves, through developing empathy and compassion, through letting-be, that is, ceasing to interfere, ceasing to view others (and “the world”) through the immorality of abstractions, and ceasing to strive to change or get involved with what goes beyond the limits determined by personal honour. For honour is only ever personal – and relates to that which affects us, as individuals, and those near to us, such as our family, or those with whom we come into contact on a personal basis. For personal honour can never be abstracted away from the immediacy of the moment – out from a living personal interaction between individuals.

The Immorality of Abstractions:

Empathy leads us away from the artificial, lifeless and thus un-numinous abstractions we have constructed and manufactured and which we impose, or project, upon other human beings, upon other life, and upon ourselves, often in an attempt to “understand” such beings and ourselves. And it is abstractions which are or which can be the genesis of prejudice, intolerance, and inhumanity. In addition, abstractions are one of the main causes of suffering: one of the main reasons we human beings have caused or contributed to the suffering of other human beings.

Abstraction (or abstractionism) – as understood by The Numinous Way – is the manufacture, and use of, some idea, ideal, “image” or category, and thus some generalization, and/or some assignment of an individual or individuals to some group or category. The positing of some “perfect” or “ideal” form, category, or thing, is part of abstraction.

According to The Numinous Way, it is immoral to apply such abstractions to what is living. Why? Because such abstractions usurp or limit or constrain our own individual judgement, which individual judgement – to be ethical – should and must be based upon empathy, that is, upon a direct and personal knowing of other individuals. All abstractions distort or destroy our correct, and of necessity our individual, perception of other human beings.

Abstractions – be they classified as political or religious or social – either predispose us to judge according to what someone else has devised or theorised, or they already contain, within themselves or within some theory or schema or model or “archetype” associated with them, a pre-judgement.

Thus, all abstractions to do with or concerning what is living, limit, restrict or undermine, or even destroy, empathy, and thus do they sever our numinous connexion to other life, and to the Cosmos itself.

An obvious example of one type of abstraction is the concept of “nation”. Thus, some individuals are said “to belong” to a particular designated “nation”, or consider themselves as belonging to a particular nation. That is, this nation becomes, for them, a source of personal identify, a provider of meaning for their lives, and a basis – often, the basis – of their judgement of others, with “their nation” becoming contrasted with others, and with they themselves often considering they have a “duty” and obligations to this particular abstraction termed a nation. Thus do differences, and conflicts, arise. Thus do people inflict suffering upon others in the name of this particular abstraction, and thus are there wars and invasions, as one “nation” – for whatever reason – wants to impose its own “values” and ideas and ways upon others.

Another obvious example of an abstraction is a political theory, or idea, or cause – such as, say, “democracy”. This abstraction (however defined) comes to be regarded – by a certain nation or government – as “right” and necessary. Some government or nation (or leader or whatever) then believes that such democracy should and can be imposed upon another nation and government, and that it is thus “right” and “moral” to use force to get “these others” to accept such an abstraction as democracy. In the process, of doing what they regard as “right”, there is of course conflict, and killing, and thus much suffering.

Yet another obvious example of an abstraction is the notion of a supra-personal culture, or way of life, or religion. This particular abstraction (be it a culture, or way of life, or religion) comes to be regarded by a certain group (be it a nation, a government or whatever) as “morally right”, as “civilized” (or even as “superior”), and this group believes it is their “duty” – or their “destiny” or whatever – to get others to accept this particular abstraction. This – as almost always – involves force or coercion or similar things. Thus is there, yet again, conflict, and killing, and thus much suffering.

Yet one more obvious example of an abstraction is a professional Army, or some large professional fighting force. Such an Army, or such a fighting force, have an allegiance – a duty – to observe a given chain-of-command, and their obligation is to do what some abstract authority commands them to do, even if they do not personally know the person or persons behind the abstract authority and even if they do not personally agree with all the orders given through such a chain-of-command. Thus will they go and fight – and kill – in the name of that abstract authority, such as some nation, or some leader who has been elected by millions of people or who has seized power. In this instance, the soldiers or fighters dehumanize both themselves, and dehumanize whatever “enemy” the abstract authority commands them to fight.

Another example of an abstraction is the judgement of an individual on the basis of their occupation or on their known or perceived political (or religious) views or on the basis of some deed they may have committed in their past. Thus, the person is viewed according to such an occupation or such views, instead of as an individual, or is judged according to the deed they have committed – or are alleged to have committed – in the past. That is, they are assigned to some abstract category, and – in a very important sense – become dehumanized, and are often treated according to whatever moral value is, abstractly, assigned to such a category or such a deed. Consider, for example, a woman categorized as being a “prostitute”. Almost always there are certain assumptions made about such a person, since the abstract category “prostitute” carries various connotations, or is assumed to denote a certain type of person. Thus, instead of being regarded, and treated as, an individual human being, the woman is regarded and treated as “a prostitute” and in the process often dehumanized. All such judgement according to such an assigned abstract category is unethical because it is not based on a personal knowing of the person; it is not based on the immediacy of empathy with that person.

What these obvious examples illustrate is a giving-up of individual judgement; a taking of the individual out of the immediacy of the numinous, personal, moment. Instead, the individual relates to, or judges by, the abstraction; refers to the abstraction for value, worth and judgement. Almost always, there is an acting on behalf of the abstraction, often with a sense of “being right” and of desiring to persuade or force others to accept or adopt this particular abstraction and a use of some sort of force or violence or coercion to persuade others to change and adopt such an abstraction. Always there is lack of letting-be; always there are impersonal generalizations; and, almost always, there is dehumanization.

According to The Numinous Way, when applied to what is living, all abstractions, by their very nature, by their very being, cause – or are or can be the genesis of – conflict and suffering. Furthermore, the individual intent behind the abstraction is irrelevant, for once empathy is lost – and empathy is only and ever individual – then there is either suffering or the potential for suffering. Thus, it does not matter if someone or some many believe that some particular abstraction is “right” and “just”, for what is right and just cannot ever reside in an abstraction, or be manifest by, an abstraction or by someone acting on behalf of such an abstraction. What is right and just only ever reside in and through and because of individual empathy and an individual, personal, honour and personal judgement.

A Better Way of Life:

According to The Numinous Way, the only ethical way in which we can change ourselves, and our society, is through an inner, individual, transformation by developing empathy and by striving to live in an ethical, and honourable, way.

There is thus a self-transformation, an inner change – a personal and very individual living according to the ethics of The Numinous Way. That is, there is compassion, empathy, honour, reason – the cessation of suffering, and the gradual evolution, development, of the individual. This is a personal change, and, in consequence, a very slow, social change. The social change arises, for example, when groups of people who follow such a Way freely decide to live in a certain manner through, for example, being part of, or creating, a small community. The social change also arises when others are inspired by the ethical example of those who are individually or collectively following such a way as The Numinous Way.

Hence, The Numinous Way is profoundly apolitical, and opposed to the use of force, and violence, in the service of any abstraction or “cause”, believing that better communities – “a better world” – can only be brought-into-being by the efforts of ethical individuals who concern themselves only with that which, and those whom, they personally know and personally interact with.

Fairness, Law and Self-Defence:

The Numinous Way expresses the view that honour is not only personal, relates to the immediacy of the moment, cannot be abstracted out from such a personal immediacy, but also depends – by its very nature – upon others treating us honourably, and with respect. This means that our personal, individual, tolerance, and compassion, have certain ethical limits, and it is these setting of very human, and ethical limits, which in one way serves to distinguish and separate The Numinous Way from other ethical philosophies, such as Buddhism, based upon compassion and upon a desire to cease to cause suffering.

Thus, while personal honour demands that we are fair and tolerant and unprejudiced and compassionate toward others, it also allows for not only self-defence, but also for the employment, if required, and as a last resort, of the use of violent force (including lethal force) to defend one’s self and those who might be in need of some immediate, honourable, and personal, assistance. Hence, if one is attacked, it is – according to The Numinous way – honourable to defend one’s self, and if the circumstances require it, ethical to use such force as is necessary, even if this means that the attackers or attackers are injured or possibly killed.

Similarly, if one finds one’s self in a personal situation where, for example, several people violently attack another individual, it would be quite honourable to come to the aid of that individual, and use whatever force necessary, because such a violent attack is, in itself, a dishonourable thing.

To so act in such a personal situation is the fair, the just, the human – even the numinous – thing to do, because our practical use of honour restores the natural balance that the dishonourable actions of such attackers have upset.

However, it is worth emphasizing again that such a use of force is only fair, honourable and ethical, in a personal situation, in the immediacy of the moment, and the individual so using such force only does so because they themselves are immediately attacked or because some one, or some others, nearby in that moment, are dishonourably attacked.

Who decides whether such a use of honourable force is justified? According to The Numinous Way, this can only and ever be the individual in the immediacy of the moment itself. It is for the individual to use their own experience and judgement: their faculties of empathy and of fairness. This is so because, as mentioned previously, personal honour can never be abstracted away from the immediacy of the moment, out from a living personal interaction between individuals, and thus cannot be enshrined in some abstraction, such as a law manufactured by someone else at some other time, or be manifest in some supra-personal abstraction, such as a government or State or their “Courts of Law”.

For true, human, justice is only and ever personal, related to and entirely dependant upon, personal honour. Hence, for The Numinous Way, the basis for all law in any community can only be personal honour.

The Spirituality of The Numinous Way

Our very individuality is a type of abstraction in itself, and thus something of an illusion, for it often obscures our relation to other life, as we often describe and define ourselves, or own personal life, in relation to, and by, our own personal desires, needs and feelings, which needs, feelings and desires we often do not understand and often do not control or, it seems, we cannot control.

Thus are we brought into conflict with others, and often ourselves; and thus do we often cause suffering, to others, and sometimes to ourselves. In addition, we often pursue the illusion which other abstractions present to us, and which we believe, or which we have been led or persuaded to believe, will bring us “peace”, security and a personal “happiness”.

However, according to The Numinous Way, all life is a manifestation of – a presencing of – what it is convenient to call acausal energy, and that it is this acausal energy which makes our physical molecules “alive”. In addition, it is this energy which is the basis for the matrix of Life: which is the connexion between us and all other life, human, on this planet Earth, and elsewhere in the Cosmos; and it is this acausal energy which forms the basis of empathy itself: what we sense, feel, and can come to know and understand, when we interact compassionately with other life.

Thus, all living beings in the physical, causal, Cosmos possess a certain type and amount of this acausal energy, which – like all energy – can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed in some way. Hence, when our physical, causal, bodies die, they die because the acausal energy which has animated them and which gave them life and vitality has ceased to be presenced – ceased to be manifest – in the causal physical Cosmos. This acausal energy – which in a causal sense, “was us”, the essence of our being – then returns to the acausal part of the Cosmos from whence it was presenced to give us our causal life. That is, it flows back to its origin, and will flow from there to become presenced in some other, causal, form, some-where, at some causal Time. Or, expressed another way, our acausal aspect – or essence, beyond the illusion of our causal, abstractive, mortal self – returns from whence “we” arose.

In a quite important sense, empathy, compassion, and a living by honour, are a means whereby we increase, or access for ourselves, acausal energy – where we presence such energy in the causal – and whereby we thus strengthen the matrix of Life, and, indeed, increase Life itself. Thus, when we live in such an ethical way we are not only aiding life here, now, in our world, in our lifetime, we are also aiding all future life, in the Cosmos, for the more acausal energy we presence, by our deeds, our living, the more will be available not only to other life, here – in our own small causal Time and causal Space – but also, on our mortal death, available to the Cosmos to bring-into-being more life. Thus will we aid – and indeed become part of – the very change, the very evolution of the life of the Cosmos itself.

This does not mean we transcend – as some conscious, individual, being – to some other acausal realm where we “live” another type of individual existence. It only means that we have used the opportunity of this, our mortal life, to increase life, to further evolution; that we have seen beyond the illusion of self to the essence, and choose the essence, the reality, over the illusion. For the illusion is of separate, discrete, unconnected living beings, while the essence, the reality, is of the flow of Life; of acausal energy being presenced in the causal, and so “creating” life. The illusion is of this mortal life as the aim, the goal, whereas the reality is of an evolving living Cosmos that we are part of, were once part of and will be part of, again.

Thus, we conceive of the very Cosmos itself as a living, evolving Being. We – all life – are not separate from this Being, but rather we are this Being, in evolution, evolving in the causal to become, by virtue of our sentience, the very consciousness of this Being, the very awareness of this Being. Similarly, Nature – the life dwelling with us on our planet, Earth – is a manifestation of this Being.

In addition, this Cosmic Being is not perfect, nor omniscient – not God, not any human-manufactured abstraction – but rather a burgeoning of Life, which Life we aid when we live with empathy, compassion and honour, when we respect other life, and which we diminish, or harm, when we do the opposite. Hence, there is not, nor cannot be, any “prayer” to this living Cosmic Being; no “reward” or “punishment” from this living Cosmic Being. Instead, there is only an empathic awareness, often – or mostly – beyond words, and presenced, manifested, sometimes, in some numinous music, or some work of Art, or in a personal love or by some honourable deed.

David Myatt (born 1950) – also known as Abdul-Aziz ibn Myatt – is British Muslim and a former neo-nazi.

Before his conversion to Islam in 1998, Myatt was the first leader of the British National Socialist Movement (NSM), and was identified by the British newspaper, The Observer, as the “ideological heavyweight” behind the violent neo-nazi group Combat 18 whose founder and leader, Charlie Sargent, was convicted, in 1998, of murder, sentenced to life imprisonment, with a recommendation that he serve at least 14 years in jail.

Following his conversion to Islam, Myatt dissociated himself from nationalism and racialism, and openly wrote and spoke about racism being unethical and dishonorable.

During his three-decade long involvement with neo-nazism, Myatt authored thousands of essays and pamphlets about National Socialism, in many of which he describes the Holocaust as “a hoax”. Following his conversion to Islam, he began writing about Islam, and so far has produced hundreds of articles, many of which advocate Islamic martyrdom operations, express support for Osama bin Laden, and the Taliban, and, in line with Al Qaida’s radical Islamist stance, support the killing of non-combatants. One of Myatt’s articles justifying suicide attacks was, for several years, on the Izz al-Din al-Qassam (the military wing) section of the Hamas website.

An April 2005 NATO workshop heard that Myatt had called on “all enemies of the Zionists to embrace the Jihad” against Jews and the United States. Political scientist Professor George Michael wrote that Myatt has “arguably done more than any other theorist to develop a synthesis of the extreme right and Islam.”

Myatt first came to public attention in 1999, a year after his conversion to Islam, when a pamphlet he wrote many years earlier, A Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution, described as a “detailed step-by-step guide for terrorist insurrection,” was said to have inspired David Copeland, who left nailbombs in areas frequented by London’s black, Asian, and gay communities. Three people died and 129 were injured in the explosions, several of them losing limbs.

Myatt was also, for many years, a member of the secret British paramilitary organization Column 88, which, it has been alleged, was part of the NATO “stay-behind” Gladio network, designed to conduct sabotage and assassinations in the events of a Soviet Invasion of Western Europe.

In addition to writing about Islam and National Socialism, Myatt has translated works by Sophocles, Sappho, Aeschylus, and Homer, and has written several collections of poems and some Occult horror stories.

It has been alleged that Myatt – using the pseudonym Anton Long – was and is the current Grand Master of the Order of Nine Angles, a Left Hand Path, or Black Magick, Occult group.

Personal life

Myatt grew up in East Africa, and later in the Far East, where he studied the martial arts. He moved to England in 1967 to complete his schooling, and began a degree in Physics but did not complete it, leaving his studies to focus on his political activism. He is reported to live in the Midlands and to have been married three times.

The British anti-fascist magazine Searchlight has written of him: “He does not have the appearance of a Nazi ideologue … Sporting a long ginger beard, Barbour jacket, cords and a tweed flat cap, he resembles an eccentric country gentleman out for a Sunday ramble. But Myatt is anything but the country squire, for beneath this seemingly innocuous exterior is a man of extreme and calculated hatred.”

Political scientist Professor George Michael has written that Myatt is an “intriguing theorist,” with a reported IQ of 187, who has embarked over the years on a series of “Faustian quests.” He studied Taoism and spent time in a Buddhist and later a Christian monastery, and is alleged to have explored the occult, as well as Paganism and what Michael calls “quasi-Satanic” secret societies.

Political activism

Myatt joined Colin Jordan’s British Movement, a neo-Nazi group, in 1968, where he sometimes acted as Jordan’s bodyguard at meetings and rallies. From the 70s until the 90s, he remained involved with paramilitary and neo-Nazi organizations such as Column 88 and Combat 18, and was imprisoned twice for violent offenses in connection with his political activism.

Myatt was the founder and first leader of the National Socialist Movement, of which David Copeland was a member. He also co-founded the neo-Nazi organization the NDFM (National Democratic Freedom Movement) which was active in Leeds, England, in the early 1970s, and founded and led the neo-Nazi Reichsfolk group.

Michael writes that Myatt took over the leadership of Combat 18 in 1998, when Charlie Sargent, the previous leader, was jailed for murder.

Alleged influence on David Copeland

In 1997, a pamphlet Myatt had written called A Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution was posted on a website run out of British Columbia, Canada, by Bernard Klatt. The pamphlet included chapter titles such as “Assassination,” “Terror Bombing,” and “Racial War.” According to Michael Whine of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, “the contents provided a detailed step-by-step guide for terrorist insurrection with advice on assassination targets, rationale for bombing and sabotage campaigns, and rules of engagement.”

In February 1998, Detectives from Scotland Yard raided Myatt’s home in Worcestershire, arrested him, and removed his computers and files. The case against him – involving allegations of incitement to murder, conspiracy to murder and incitement to racial hatred – was dropped after a three year international investigation because the evidence supplied by the Canadian authorities was not enough to secure a conviction.

It was this pamphlet that, in 1999, allegedly influenced David Copeland, the London nailbomber – also a member of Myatt’s National Socialist Movement – who planted homemade bombs in Brixton, Brick Lane, and inside the Admiral Duncan pub on Old Compton Street in London, frequented by the black, Asian, and gay communities respectively. Friends John Light, Nick Moore, and Andrea Dykes and her unborn child died in the Admiral Duncan pub. Copeland told police he had been trying to spark a “racial war.”

According to the BBC’s Panorama program about Copeland broadcast in 2000, when Myatt was leader of the NSM, he called for “the creation of racial terror with bombs.” Myatt is also quoted by Searchlight as having stated that “the primary duty of all National Socialists is to change the world. National Socialism means revolution: the overthrow of the existing System and its replacement with a National-Socialist society. Revolution means struggle: it means war. It means certain tactics have to be employed, and a great revolutionary movement organized which is primarily composed of those prepared to fight, prepared to get their hands dirty and perhaps spill some blood”.

According to another account:

“[A] case of interest is that of the former neo-Nazi ideologue David Myatt, who now goes by the name Abdul Aziz ibn Myatt. For much of his life, Myatt has been a propagandist, recruiter, and street thug for a number of neo-Nazi groups in Britain, and has spent time in prison for racist attacks. Perhaps he is most famous as the founder of the National Socialist Movement, a group whose members included the nailbomber and killer of three, David Copeland, and as the author of a terrorist manual entitled ‘The Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution’. Eventually, Myatt gave up on the idea of ‘Aryan Revolution’ and now embraces Jihadism instead.”

ONA

According to various sources, the Order of Nine Angles (ONA) was originally formed in England in the 1960s, with the merger of three neopagan temples called Camlad, The Noctulians, and Temple of the Sun. Following the original leader’s emigration to Australia, it has been alleged that Myatt took over the order and began writing the now publicly-available teachings of the ONA. The ONA now has associates, and groups, in the United States, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South America, and Russia.

Author Nick Ryan has asserted that Anton Long, the author of the ONA’s public tracts, is a pseudonym of Myatt This assertion is repeated by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, who claims that Myatt was the founder of the ONA and writer of most of the ONA documents. The allegation has also been repeated many times by the anti-fascist Searchlight organization.

Myatt has always denied such allegations about involvement with the ONA, and using the pseudonym Anton Long, and repeatedly challenged anyone to provide any evidence of such allegations. In addition, Myatt challenged two journalists – Nick Lowles (from Searchlight) and Nick Ryan – to a duel for repeating such allegations, a challenge which they both declined.

Conversion to Islam

Myatt converted to Islam in 1998. He told writer George Michael that his decision to convert began when he took a job on a farm in England. He was working long hours in the fields and felt an affinity with nature, concluding that the sense of harmony he felt had not come about by chance. He told Michael that he was also impressed by the militancy of Islamist groups, and believed that he shared common enemies with Islam, namely “the capitalist-consumer West and international finance.”

Shortly after his conversion, some critics and observers suggested that Myatt’s conversion was insincere and “may be just a political ploy to advance his own failing anti-establishment agenda.”

Gerry Gable, from anti-fascist magazine Searchlight, said:

“Myatt is an ethereal character. He is a dangerous man who has twice been jailed for his violent right-wing activities and who openly asked for blood to be spilled in the quest for white Aryan domination. We believe… he remains a deeply intellectual subversive and is still one of the most hardline Nazi intellectuals in Britain today. Myatt believes in the disruption of existing societies as a prelude to the creation of a new more warrior-like Aryan society which he calls the Galactic Empire.”

Others, however, accepted his conversion as genuine, and – given Myatt’s voluminous writings in praise of Islam and his support for the Taliban and his acceptance by other Muslims – this acceptance of his conversion as genuine gradually became the general consensus, although the rumors regarding his conversion continued to persist.

The Numinous Way

In 2007 – as in some previous years – rumors began circulating that Myatt had abandoned Islam in favor of his own earlier philosophy, The Numinous Way, which he had allegedly, in the past few years, continued to develop.

However, Myatt himself has denied this, issuing several public statements in which he affirms that he is a Muslim. He has also continued, using his Muslim name of Abdul-Aziz, to write and publish Islamist articles, the most recent one being dated 15 Zul al-Qidah 1429 [November 2008] and entitled In Reply to John Hutton: Concerning the Infidel Invasion and Occupation of the Muslim land of Afghanistan.

According to one anonymous essay, The Numinous Way, as developed since 2006, is:

“A practical, and spiritual, way of living… providing answers to fundamental philosophical, and ethical, questions. The Numinous Way is apolitical. Empathy may be said to be the essence of The Numinous Way – empathy with life, with Nature; with other human beings; with the very Cosmos itself. From empathy arises compassion – the desire to cease to cause suffering, the desire to alleviate suffering – and honour is how we can do this, how we can restrain ourselves and so do the right, the moral, the empathic, thing.”

According to Myatt himself, writing as Abd al-Aziz:

“Over then years ago, I converted to Islam and, despite past and present rumours and disinformation, I am still a Muslim, Alhamdulillah, and I shall remain a Muslim, InshaAllah.

As for my own political views and opinions now, I have none. For I am a Muslim, and so view this world, and its peoples, according to Deen Al-Islam, striving to think according to Deen Al-Islam, and striving to live according to the laws and customs of Islam, as revealed in the Quran and through the words, deeds and example of the noble Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa sallam). My only loyalty and obedience is to Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala.

As a Muslim, I regard the Way of Al-Islam as complete and perfect, and superior to the materialistic, arrogant, way of life which now dominates all the societies of the West. Thus, I reject nationalism, racialism, the kaffir-manufactured concept of “the State”, and all the other Tawagheet of the kuffar.”

Jeffrey Kaplan, Religiosity and the Radical Right: Toward the Creation of a New Ethnic Identity, in Jeffrey Kaplan and Tore Bjorgo, eds., Nation and Race: The Developing Euro-American Racist Subculture (Northeastern University Press, 1998)

Jeffrey Kaplan (University of Helsinki) in Krista Vogelberg, Raili Pöldsaar. Negotiating Spaces on the Common Ground: Selected Papers of the 3rd and 4th International Tartu Conferences on North-American Studies. Tartu University Press, 2000 ISBN 9985401492, 9789985401491

Mr Evil: The Secret Life of Racist Pub Bomber David Copeland by Graeme McLagen and Nick Lowles (Blake Publications, England, July 2000)

Whine, Michael. Cyberspace: A New Medium for Communication, Command and Control by Extremists. International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism, 1999